Worth It
by MoonrockBlink1772
Summary: After a stressful day at Harvard, Jazz recieves a phone call in the middle of the night. Meanwhile, Danny comes to terms with the fact that everything he's done will be for naught. [twoshot]
1. Jazz

**Worth It**

Jazz sighed, leaning back in her chair. Her computer clock read 4:00AM, but that was still Amity Park time - in actuality it was probably closer to 5:00. She'd been up all night, perfecting her paper, while her roommate, who'd already finished it and wasn't all that concerned with getting anything higher than a B, dozed on.

College was tough. Tougher when you couldn't stop worrying about your sixteen-year-old half-ghost brother.

Said half-ghost brother had called the morning before to tell her that he'd broken nine bones in an attempt to stop his archenemy from murdering their father, and that he would be in the hospital for quite awhile to come.

But she couldn't go home, not now. Exams were coming up. There were papers to be written, textbooks to be read. As soon as the semester was over, she'd go home for a bit, hopefully long enough to see Danny out of the hospital, and then it would start all over again - the work, the worrying, the loss of sleep.

Was it worth it? Career-wise, probably. A psychology major from Harvard would practically guarantee a long and fruitful career. Emotionally, maybe not. Her younger brother's life was complicated and dangerous, and it gave her more than enough to worry about without the rigors of school. His decision to not even try to get into college was worrisome, and his mounting amount of injuries was disturbing.

"Danny," Jazz sighed. He was probably asleep right now, for the first time in _days_, and heavily drugged. "Danny, Danny."

Perhaps she was stupid to leave for Harvard, and not go to the Amity Park University (AmiUni, as it was often referred to by the city's residents and the school's students). But her parents, who were still blissfully unaware of their son's problems, wouldn't let her do that, anyway.

She drew her hands off her keyboard and ran them through her hair. _Two more sentences_, she thought tiredly. _I can type that up later. _She stood up and flopped into the bed without changing, trying to ignore Rosalie's snoring.

Just as she was drifting off to sleep, her cell phone rung. _Brrr-ing, brrr-ing, brrr-ing . . ._

Jumping out of bed, Jazz rushed to her purse and dug out her cell phone. _Don't let it be Danny, don't let it be Danny . . ._

"Hello?" she said worriedly.

Her mother's voice, hoarse with tears, came from the other end. "It's Danny, Jazz." Her throat constricted. "He's not . . . doing so well. And the doctors seem to have found a high degree of ecto-contamination in his blood. You ought to come down here."

Jazz nodded, unaware Mrs. Fenton couldn't see her, and turned off her phone, before grabbing her purse and car keys and running to her car. It would be a long night's drive, but she had to see Danny. She had to protect him, and, yet again, his secret.

Was it worth it?


	2. Danny

_A/N: Because I felt like it._

Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or any characters associated, nor am I making any money off of this.

**Worth It - Part II**

_If I die here, after all this . . . _Danny thought to himself, as doctors swarmed around him, preparing him for surgery. He was all too conscious, though they didn't realize that. It was a rather interesting side effect of being half ghost. There were very few human gasses that affected him in any way, shape, or form. Air had stopped being a necessity. And anesthesia was completely useless. Hallelujah for his ridiculously high tolerance for pain.

All in all, he mused, he'd better get used to this, anyway. There's no way major surgery like this wouldn't reveal _something _that couldn't be explained away, like the ectoplasmic residue in his blood had been. It wasn't quite fair for a sixteen-year-old who'd already given up his entire future to have to resign himself to the fact that he was either going to be carted off for government experiments (his ghost half was a wanted fugitive in both worlds, for crying out loud), and, if that didn't happen, he was going to be dead, anyway.

It was true, his sister would likely be here eventually, and would try and come up with a valid excuse for things. She'd covered for him hundreds of times, nursed hundreds of wounds, and prevented him from going over the edge more times than he could count. And he was happy for it.

Mentally wincing as they started the first incision, Danny resisted the urge to become intangible. Vlad - who was, in all likelihood, staying with his parents 'in their time of need' - would be getting such a kick out of the whole thing. His father had no idea there had been an attempt on his life, his mother was probably expressing her gratitude for her college friend's oh-so-sincere remorse, Danny himself was in the ER being cut open so that some serious internal damage could be repaired (Danny winced again at the thought), and Jazz was rushing from her Harvard dorm to cover for her younger brother's abnormalities.

It was hardly worth it, anymore. The ghosts nowadays came with stronger powers, larger groups, and more fervid hatred. They had become more and more difficult to fight off. His secret was getting harder to conceal. His friendship with Sam and Tucker, though still strong, was starting to slip. It had been a year since he'd been able to actual consider a serious romantic relationship a possibility. He'd long since given up hopes of college, or becoming an astronaut. The idea of getting a _job _was becoming more and more like a bizarre fantasy, what with the fact that his grade average was at an all-time low, with his highest grade a mere D in gym.

So then, there he was. Lying on a surgery table in Amity Park General, trying to keep himself from revealing the fact that, yes, he was still awake, and couldn't be anesthetized, fully aware that at any moment his secret would be out. Or he would be dead. Either way, everything he'd done in the past two years would be for naught, as he wouldn't be able to protect these people who regarded him as such a pariah.

Jazz, Tucker, and Sam. The only three people he could be sure wouldn't turn on him. Jazz more than Sam and Tuck of course. She was his sister, after all. She'd never had Tucker's jealousy issues, or Sam's eventual overriding concern that he was doing too much, or would die out there someday. The concern that had led one of his best friends to launch a campaign to get him to stop. But Jazz . . . Jazz just _understood_. She worried, sure, and he wouldn't have trusted her so much if she hadn't, but she understood. She understood that it wasn't some noble choice he'd made, or something he did because it made him feel good. She understood it was a burden that had been thrust upon him all because he _pushed a freaking button_, and that it was one he hated more than anything else in the world. That it was something that he simply had to do because there was no one else. He'd be glad to quit . . . Except he couldn't. For some reason, Sam didn't get that. Neither did Tucker.

So.

A multitude of broken bones, and several serious internal injuries. One painful surgery. Two years of self-sacrifice for people who didn't want anything more than to see him dead. One secret revealed. Twenty-three years with the Guys in White. One early death at age thirty-nine.

One sister who earned herself a two-year stay in jail for trying to help him out, and who would give anything - including her own chance at a successful future - for him.

Was it worth it?


End file.
